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Julian Assange Launches Legal Challenge Against Trump Administration (theguardian.com)
SonicSpike shares a report from The Guardian: Julian Assange, the fugitive WikiLeaks founder whose diplomatic sanctuary in the Ecuadorian embassy appears increasingly precarious, is launching a legal challenge against the Trump administration. Lawyers for the Australian activist have filed an urgent application to the Washington-based Inter-American Commission of Human Rights (IACHR) aimed at forcing the hand of U.S. prosecutors, requiring them to "unseal" any secret charges against him. The legal move is an attempt to prevent Assange's extradition to the U.S. at a time that a new Ecuadorian government has been making his stay in the central London apartment increasingly inhospitable.
The 1,172-page submission by Assange's lawyers calls on the U.S. to unseal any secret charges against him and urges Ecuador to cease its "espionage activities" against him. Baltasar Garzon, the prominent Spanish judge who has pursued dictators, terrorists and drug barons, is the international coordinator of Assange's legal team. He has said the case involves "the right to access and impart information freely" that has been put in "jeopardy." The Trump administration is refusing to reveal details of charges against Assange despite the fact that sources in the U.S. Department of Justice have confirmed to the media that they exist under seal. The application alleges that U.S. prosecutors have begun approaching people in the U.S., Germany and Iceland and pressed them to testify against Assange in return for immunity from prosecution. Those approached, it is said, include people associated with WikiLeaks' joint publications with other media about U.S. diplomacy, Guantanamo Bay and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
The 1,172-page submission by Assange's lawyers calls on the U.S. to unseal any secret charges against him and urges Ecuador to cease its "espionage activities" against him. Baltasar Garzon, the prominent Spanish judge who has pursued dictators, terrorists and drug barons, is the international coordinator of Assange's legal team. He has said the case involves "the right to access and impart information freely" that has been put in "jeopardy." The Trump administration is refusing to reveal details of charges against Assange despite the fact that sources in the U.S. Department of Justice have confirmed to the media that they exist under seal. The application alleges that U.S. prosecutors have begun approaching people in the U.S., Germany and Iceland and pressed them to testify against Assange in return for immunity from prosecution. Those approached, it is said, include people associated with WikiLeaks' joint publications with other media about U.S. diplomacy, Guantanamo Bay and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Yeah, it's always easy to hear the truth when the truth is what you want it to be. When its not what you want it to be, it's a lot tougher to swallow.
Partisans always love to hear any evidence that their people are good and their enemies are bad. But any suggestion that their people are, or even can be, bad too is seen as blasphemy.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
Why is it that the US believes it can interfere openly in other nations' elections, but its own should be untouchable? Just yesterday the former US ambassador to Moscow confessed (or bragged) in an effort to sell his new book that he spent a shitload of US government money on Putin "opposition" in efforts to remove Putin from power. How is that acceptable, but the reverse is not?
Of course, this is a question about general principles only, as the actual evidence that Russia has effectively meddled in US elections simply does not exist. The best "evidence" we've seen so far are allegations that Russia has paid a few hundred thousand dollars to advertise on social media (compare that with nearly ONE BILLION DOLLARS that Hillary Clinton spent - that's like 3 or 4 DIGITS in the number more), and the wild allegations about "Russian hackers", who, if one believes the media, are super-powerful and can do anything.
The only real thing they may have done is the DNC attack, a simple phishing operation, which speaks more about the stupidity of the victims than the capability of the "hackers". Besides, even if we accept that it was "stolen" by the "Russian hackers" and then passed to Assange, the DNC emails leak did not influence the elections at all. The democrat leadership like to present it so just because the emails show to their party rank that their representatives are sleazy shitbags and that US politics is rotten to the core, but let's be real, who doesn't already know that?
Comey's comments about those other emails did the biggest external damage to Hillary. Comey would not have been able to make those if Hillary had followed the law. Also, the effect of Comey's investigations is a distant second to Hillary's disgusting personality. "It is my turn" was her campaign slogan. Really, now? The rest was done by the sensationalist US media, which blew the "Trump factor" out of all proportion, embiggening bigly another shitbag just for the lulz. Won't you blame the US media greed on Russian hackers, too? Anyone could have beaten a campaign like Hillary's, and anyone did. No "Russian hackery" needed, even stellar one, of which the Russians aren't capable anyway.
What is wrong with the Bulgarian sources? Bulgaria is a NATO member, an EU member, and the mobsters and former communists in charge of the country are nowadays very pro-American and conservative or liberal as necessary. They have been very welcome at the US Prayer Breakfast every year for quite a while now. The Bulgarian sources are the best sources.